All about WHO, the global health watchdog attacked as 'Chinese Health Organization'

New Delhi : US President Donald Trump Tuesday made a series of contradictory statements with regard to the World Health Organization (WHO). Japan’s deputy Prime Minister Taro Aso said the body should be renamed as the “ Chinese Health Organization ” as he accused it of toeing the China line on the pandemic. In 1958, the erstwhile United Socialist Soviet Republic, or USSR, had proposed a WHO-led smallpox eradication programme. The next year, in 1967, the WHO began its Intensified Eradication Program that focused on mass vaccinations, and it proved to be a huge success. In 1978, the WHO adopted the Declaration of Alma-Ata , calling on “urgent and effective national and international action to develop and implement primary health care throughout the world”. The declaration was considered historic for identifying the role and necessity of primary healthcare in assuring health facilities for all. It has come under fire in recent years for its heavy bureaucratic framework, which has led to inefficiencies, inertia, and even “over reactions”. As a consequence, member states bought billions of doses of vaccines that ultimately remained unused, leading to a wastage of resources and money. So have individual countries, including India, which has suspended travel and also advised people to wear masks when they step out of their homes. Calls for reform in the organisation have been raised for long as its actions have sometimes deviated from its core goals — as was the case with the 2009 swine flu and now with the novel coronavirus.